The Beck Diet Solution is a psychological program, not a food plan. It provides a step-by-step program to learn specific techniques to stay on our diet, lose weight, and maintain our weight loss for life. The program is based on Dr. Beck's clinical research in Cognitive Therapy (CT).

The Complete Beck Diet for Life expands the earlier work and includes a food plan with suggested menus. From the cover:

With The Complete Beck Diet for Life you'll discover the 5 stages of successful deiting and maintenance. You'll learn how to motivate yourself, give yourself credit for every change you make, create time and energy for dieting, and handle hunger and cravings. Dr. Beck easues you into changing one step at a time. You'll master one task before monving on to the next. And you'll learn tehcniques to deal with challenging situations, such as sticking with ou plan at celebrations and dealing with "food pushers." With Dr. Beck's skills, you'll acheive a lifetime of healthful eating and lifelong motivation.

This is a place to discuss the Beck strategies and our daily efforts, to receive and provide support, and, for some of us, is where we serve as on-line diet buddy (coach) to each other.

If youve arrived from a search engine, youve landed at the site of 3 fat chicks, a remarkable place for those interested in a healthy life style, including mindful eating, exercise, and weight loss. More about the site, including how to register so that you can post can be found here.

The books are available on Amazon through the 3FC store by clicking their names above; buying through 3FC helps to cover the costs of running this site.

Diet Coaches/Buddies - Absolute down pour as I drove home from work. Then it stopped just when I was ready to walk to the gym. Had a good session with a focus on feeling the burn rather than getting done; CREDIT moi. Rain started again after I had walked home. Felt like the skies were taking care of me.

Had dinner at the house of friends last night. I ate rationally enough to declare it on-plan; CREDIT moi. It was easy since they serve and eat rationally. It was rather nice to know before we went that the evening wasn't going to be a struggle. Wish all eating out occasions were that comfortable.

Slept late this morning. Erika (eusebius) starts practicing CBT sleep therapy and everyone on the thread begins to sleep better; now that's group therapy at its best.

Jean (kuhljeanie) - Yea for making plans for the opening of your art-and-music-centric bakery; I just purchased non-refundable airplane tickets to Ohio for your August 1st, 2012 grand opening. Will you post your menu with calories online so I can plan my treat before I get there?

Thanks for the moral that we never regret not eating something, but frequently regret eating stuff. Yep, good to remember that.

onebyone - Kudos for noticing that you were "forking it in" before finishing the current bite. Good Beck stuff to be self observing.

Sending supportive thoughts for finishing that order and getting it in the mail. Know that that's been hanging over your head for a spell here.

Robin (RobinW) - Kudos for checking in even when you're not feeling in your stride. Yea for not gaining. Kudos to your DD for "managing her sugar cravings." I'm jealous of your yard sale - wish I could add a ton of stuff to it.

Thanks for the reminder, LOL, "Sometimes it's better to be lucky than right!"

ChinaMaine - Yep, Bing Cherries have enough good stuff to rationalize eating them whenever available. Yea for Mom's annoying little sayings such as, "Things work out for the best" which we remember as adults and begin repeating. There must be some evolution advantage to annoying our kids, LOL.

Kudos for walking Moose twice and doing a high heart rate kayak session. With Moose as your only companion for the week, would seem like the ideal time to ask such questions as, "Honey, do these jeans make me look fat?"

Erika (eusebius) - Ouch that all the blah's stack up at once. Kudos for going for a walk anyway, even if you might "collapse in the middle of it." Perhaps it's time to sing with your DD one of my favorite childhood ditties

Coaches I'm here to report in on this one thing:
1. weight change from yesterday +1.0 (269.8)

It doesn't phase me (except that it's so verrrryclose to 270 again. Persist in victory I remind myself here.) Oh Well. I know why it's up 1) waiting for the you-know-what=fluid retention and 2)salty food in my big takeout meal last night.

So I've already been on the bus downtown and back. I wanted to start the kiln this morning and get a firing in since it's a holiday here on Monday which makes it a short firing week in the ceramic room and so I get there and see a note on the door

Quote:

Due to the Civic Holiday the Ottawa School of Art will be closed August 1, 2 and 3rd reopening August 4th.

Wish I had known that before I set the alarm for 6:15pm and woke up before it and got up and dragged my butt and my queasy body downtown only to turn right around and come home again.

Plus side? credit: spontaneous exercise in taking the long way to the bus and then back home.
Also a credit in knowing I did what I could when I get flack for it from students next week who are waiting for their stuff to be done already.

I'm off to package my order up and then plan out the rest of the day. It's a weekend to get ready for art shows: one for sure in two weekends and possibly one this coming weekend if I can make enough stuff I'll do it. Look for me putting Beck's promises to the test this week and next week for sure as I will be burning the candle at both ends to make a pile of $, maybe.

BTW I got a note from a local community paper that they want to do an article on the "large quilt they heard we put together" at our "event held July 18th" and would like to hear how it went from someone in our "group". You know, newspapers are folding left and right and here's a good reason why. We submitted press releases and event notices to all the local papers including this one. Our event was July 18 it's now Aug 1st. We were contacted by this editor July 29. What kind of a story is it now? it's over. We can say it was great you should have been there-okay. And as for the quilt, well it was a painted mural, and as for our group we are two people. All the information to get it right before he emailed us at the show's email address is on the net. Fact-checking, hello? He knows the show's name because it is the email address yet he couldn't bother to learn the facts of what we did. And he's the editor of a local paper supposedly keen to disseminate local news. It's like someone played the telephone game or he heard a rumour and wants to report it. Hello? STILL. It's press, albeit kind of late. Whatever. Call me old school but it's not even Journalism 101.

oooo. I'm feisty today.

I'm off. Enjoy your fantastic Saturday.

__________________ 5lbs at a time. one * for every pound lost. RESTART:19/1/2015 - 284.8lbs

Last edited by onebyone : 08-01-2009 at 10:05 AM.
Reason: being disturbed at the enormous amount of typos in this one short note.

Morning everyone and Happy August.
After a fairly good night's sleep and some sinus medication I am feeling a bit better, though exhausted. This is a long weekend up here in the frozen north and I am trying not to obsess about how the heck I'm going to amuse my hyper daughter for 3 days while in a semiconscious state. (a new lego set perhaps??)

wndranne - what was the workbook you found? Glad people are finding the CBT/sleep stuff useful!!

onebyone - The pound will disappear! Good job seeing the bright side of the annoying civic holiday closure and getting spontaneous exercise. I think you're totally right about newspapers - our local one is pretty much the same. Hey, I think you invented a new art form - giant painted quilts, LOL! (Sounds cozy.)

Hugs to all and good wishes for the weekend,
Erika

__________________

1 carrot for every 5 pounds lost with Weight Watchers (start May 2015)!

I did an upper body workout, walked Moose and kayaked for 30 minutes. After lunch a friend and I drove down to Boothbay, to the Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens. We walked around there for over 2 hours. Its really the nicest Botanical Gardens Ive been to. Its 250 acres with nearly a mile of tidal frontage. The gardens are amazing, from somewhat ornamental to very naturalistic gardens. They have an exhibit now of a very talented sculptor who uses rebar and other metals to create impressive sculptures of animals. The sculptures are scattered throughout the gardens among the plants, granite and schist. I'm tired and will hit the hay early, but it was a nice day.

WI-up .5 lbs, Read my cards, made a plan. Food  op (I was very hungry today, but appear to be staying op in terms of calories), Exercise  op

Kuhljeanie Congrats for losing 37 lbs! Youll get there with the rest of the weight youd like to lose. that DD is doing so well with the sugar issues. The student surpasses the master?

one by one It sounds as though eating the favorite meal was a real challenge. Credit for meeting that challenge so well.

Ouch that no one let you know the Art School was closed. And for the unresponsive local editor. But credit for being feisty in the face of it!

Margaret Its a great idea to write down your sabotaging thoughts. Have you noticed a pattern of the most common thought you have, or type of thought? And credit for looking up the menu for the in-laws dinner.

Bill It is a relief to eat someplace where food is rational, isnt it? Moose, to his great credit, thinks Im perfect. (Well as long as he gets lots of treats and short walks.) Im sure he never thought I looked fat The cat on the other hand believes my lap is getting much too small. She cant fit in it anymore!

Anne Hope the bike ride went well!

Erika Legos  wonderful stuff! I hope you and your daughter enjoy the 3 day weekend.

Coaches/Buddies OK, I've come to some conclusions. Sitting around waiting for this mood to pass isn't a really effective strategy. So. Time to get it together. I'm working my CBT exercises for my eating stuff again. Issues I've been having lately:

I don't feel like planning my food.

I deserve to eat more since I'm training hard and have greater nutritional needs.

I don't have the mental energy to deal with this right now.

There are probably more, but that covers maybe 80% of my issues on the weight management front.

So I'm getting mental energy. I decided to deal with my stress at work with some CBT techniques. What exactly am I afraid of anyway? What are the likely outcomes? What actions can I take to increase my odds of good outcomes? What are the sabotaging thoughts that are getting in the way of that? So, bye bye dishrag, hello Anne.

I think getting that dealt with will help my sleep issues as well, which I'm also starting to deal with directly CBT techniques.

So here I go. I need a few days under my belt and I'll really believe I'm doing something rather than just talking about it and wishing. Action is way more effective than wishing.

I had a good ride this morning. Exercise helps. I need to work a little more consistency on that front, and maybe less epic, get-a-week's-worth-of-exercise-in-one-day rides.

Bill Thanks for getting the thread started this month as usual. So glad you're back. Here's to rational eating with friends.

onebyone Sorry about your ceramic room being closed. Glad you got some spontaneous exercise out of it. The editor sounds like he needs a refresher course!

Erika Glad to hear you got some sleep. Wishing you a few more good nights to combat exhausted. I know how that feels.

ChinaMaine Sounds like you got lots of exercise! How are your fatigue levels doing?

See you all tomorrow!

Anne

__________________
Long enough have you dream'd contemptible dreams,
Now I wash the gum from your eyes,
You must habit yourself to the dazzle of the light and of every moment of your life.

Got 11,000+ steps today--yay! It helped that dh suggested an early morning walk for coffee so I had a jumpstart. The most common sabotage on days off is the thought "I'm too busy to take a walk," or "Isn't this wasting time?" as if exercise had no redeeming qualities. . .

Tracked food, credit. Weekly average calories OP, credit. Only ate half the roll at birthday dinner, though did eat more than a bit of dh's dessert--the in-laws were doing the "It's your birthday, you have to have dessert" thing. I think Beck has something to say about it being ok to take care of ourselves. I need to remember it next time.

ChinaMaine--That's so cool you went kayaking! And walking around botanical gardens is one of my favorite ways to get steps.

eusebius--hope your sinuses clear up, and you find ways to connect with your daughter in spite of grogginess.

onebyone--yay on the spontaneous exercise even though taking a bus somewhere and having to turn around go back really sucks.

wndranne--credit for getting a CBT insomnia workbook! Hopefully that'll shake some of the unhelpful thoughts loose.

Bill--Kudos on the gym trip and staying present and focused. So nice to hear that eating out went well, and was comfortable--I love that feeling.

Well, I only have one more day of food celebrations - tomorrow. Thank goodness!

Last night we went to Subway. I ordered the Turkey, no cheese, light mayo and veggies with water to drink 6" sub on wheat. I did great. Then I found out one of my friends had bought literally $20 worth of munchies for the evening while we all scrapbooked. I tried to stay conscientous but it is so hard when you are surrounded by it. I ended up eating 1/2 a big grab bag of Cool Ranch Dorritos and about 4 big handfuls of Crunch n Munch and a couple handfuls of Mike & Ikes. Eek . I still didn't eat as much as I usually do, and I had budgeted calorie wise for some snacks but I was just mad that I actually indulged!

Today at breakfast I did so much better. For the first time ever, I left 1/2 of my plate of food!!!!! This was HUGE for me. I literally cut my food in half and ate exactly 1/2 of what they brough me. I boxed the rest up and took him home and told my husband he can have it for breakfast tomorrow morning (he was thrilled!). I was so happy and I wasn't bloated at all which is unusual. Usually I'm bloated and uncomfortable. I felt good. Yea me! I didn't eat much for lunch because of the breakfast. I just ate 1 tbsp of peanut butter on 1 slice of 7grain bread and some water.

Tonight was the next challenge. Dinner. And it was my favorite food in the world - Mexican. Oh boy. This is my hardest meal of all. We got there, I ate some chips and salsa because that is my favorite food. I tore each chip in half or thirds so I would eat less of them (that's one of my tricks) but I still probably ate more than I should have. I don't know how much though as I was enthralled with talking to everyone (there was 10 of us). My bad . I usually order the 2 tacos, rice and beans combo. I ordered only 1 taco (thereby cutting what I normally have it half) and then I left about a 1/3 of the rice and beans. I thought I was in the clear and already mad at myself for eating as much as I did and then all the waiters come over and sing happy birthday and present me with flan. Oh boy. I offered some to every single person at the table and all 10 declined! I was like, "someone's got to help me eat this!" No one would so I ate it because I felt bad.

I feel like I totally screwed up today. I tried so hard to eat less and do exactly what I was supposed to do but feel like I really screwed up. The only meal of the 3 since Friday I feel good about is breakfast. I feel like I'm never going to get this right. Why couldn't I just stick to my normal weekday routine?

I have one more meal at dinner tomorrow as we are going to my parent's house tomorrow to celebrate with them. There will be dinner and cake.

Diet Coaches/Buddies - Lovely summer day to enjoy a long walk; CREDIT moi. Found good cukes and cauliflower at the farmer's market. That's always a joy.

Discovered that the good rain we've been having helped the weeds in our vegetable garden as well as the veggies. Oh Well. I felt like I'd abandoned my dear beans when I found them struggling for sunlight under the towering grass. Picked some cherry tomatoes - the big ones are still not ripe, yellow beans, and kale. Some good eating is coming.

onebyone - Kudos for getting up at 6:15 am to service your impatient students. Ouch for the school shutting down when the buses are running - especially since I recall that recently it was the other way around, LOL.

Yay for remaining in the 60's. Yep Persist in Victory.

Glad for your feisty journalism tirade. I too fear that journalism will take a deep hit along with the declining fortunes of the printed newspapers. I'll miss both; I read the Boston Globe every day hoping for some perspective and judgmental filtering of the news.

Robin (RobinW) - Will you kindly, and discreetly of course, tell me whether it's more proper tomorrow to wish our Ontario friends on this thread, "Happy August Civic Holiday" or "Joyous August Civic Holiday?" I want to get it right and not sound like, well, an uninformed American who is clueless to the nuances of the Great North. Will you be celebrating it yourself, cooking the traditional "Civic Holiday" dishes so that your DD retains the culture?

Anne (wndranne) - Well Hello Anne. Honking Big Kudos for grabbing life, putting one foot in front of the other, and trusting yourself that you'll find a path once you get walking. Thanks for the demo on how to do that.

Love your way of asking CBT type questions about work, especially "What are the likely outcomes?" I'm capable of harboring dire fears in a situation where there won't be harsh consequences even if the worst happens. It can be like I was reliving seventh grade when it would have been sooooooo embarrassing to be corrected by the teacher. Good luck on what you're trying to do for yourself.

ChinaMaine - Kudos for all the good exercise. Do you kayak to specific natural spots to look about, or just randomly about the open water?

Amazingly enough, I've been to the Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens - its reputation reaches to Boston for sure. We spent hours there. Loved the sculptures. DW noted every plant and grass - all well labeled. I enjoyed the walk and the thoughtful layouts everywhere. There was a section of little habitats built by kids that was neat.

Erika (eusebius) - Yay for a good night's sleep and for feeling a bit better. LOL at "worms and dirt" - that appeals to me, also.

More Legos sounds like the world's best diversion. Does your DD have a set of wooden blocks made from real hardwood? I never brought those for my kids because they were ridiculously expensive, but I wish that I had.

Margaret (Nuxmaga) - Ouch for having to face the in-laws pushing food because "It's your birthday." Kudos for making it a sane meal anyway.

And Kudos for that 11K steps - good walking day there.

Kara (Walking Princess) - Kudos for working hard on your weekend of birthday celebrations. (I'm detecting a theme about birthdays around this thread, LOL.)

Great job at Subways; Ouch for getting broadsided while scrap booking with your friends. That would have been a difficult situation for me also.

Sending supportive thoughts for your last challenge tonight.

Readers -

Quote:

To think like a thin person you must learn to tell the difference between hunger and the desire to eat.

Bill~ no, the civic holiday is just a wonderful (paid)day off in the middle of the summer time.(everything is closed too) We've never wished each other a happy civic holiday. When we were kids it was usually the time my parents took holidays and we were either at the beach, camp or some theme park. It is just a wonderful paid holiday for the Canadians. I have a rather complicated custody agreement but it guarantees she spends equal time with both parents...so she still gets Canada time with her dad.

Had our yard sale yesterday. The girls made more money selling lemonaide and timbits than I did selling my junk! I ended up putting a big "Free" sign on stuff at noon. I wasnt sitting out in that heat any longer Shipped the girls off to the pool, and I came home and colored my hair

Im about ready to refocus. I really wish I didnt have to do this...meaning I wish I was still focused. Oh Well.

Its raining here this morning, so I think we will all hit the movies and see the latest Harry Potter!

Resuming my program with Day 19, I have just made an "IT's NOT OKAY" (to eat unplanned foods) response card. I use the memotome.com service to send myself emails with my ARC and other cards several times daily.

This morning the pesky extra pound was gone. I am maintaining the 4-pound loss from last week, which seems reasonable. Yesterday I was tempted to eat an entire bag of goldfish crackers (3 cheese, mmm) but limited myself to a 3-point serving - credit.
Didn't walk, though - cold symptoms too severe. Hoping to resume walking tomorrow.

For those who are wondering about the CBT for insomnia program, I am starting week 2 this week. In the first week you keep a log of hours slept, time you went to bed, time you actually went to sleep, number of times you got up, etc. Then you establish an average of how many hours you slept each night and plan to allow a bit more than that average in bed for the 2nd week. So, for example, if you slept an average of 6 hours a night, you'd allow 6.5 hours per night in bed. Then you establish a going-to-sleep time and rising time and don't go to bed until the going-to-sleep time ... which is usually much later than you're used to going to bed! This way you're more tired when you go to sleep and you're likely to sleep more deeply.
*ChinaMaine* - Great job keeping your exercise up!! The Botanical Gardens sound stunning. We have some beautiful ones here in Hamilton if you ever visit.

*wndranne* - You have a winning attitude and with this I know you'll succeed! CBT really does work! I am finding myself wishing Judith Beck would write a book in her no-nonsense style to deal with everything else in our lives, LOL!

*Nuxmaga* - WTG on 11,000 steps!! I totally hear you on the sabotaging thought, "Isn't this wasting time?" So often this is what I tell myself when I do something just for me. Great job on staying OP with food as well!

*Kara* - You will be fine. Beck has something for us to say about days like these - "Oh Well!" You can get right back on track today. Sending good thoughts your way.

*Bill* - I don't think I can come up with a healthier way to spend a day than a long walk to the farmer's market. That's just intrinsically good in so many ways. DD did have hardwood blocks ... someone bought them for us, thank goodness. She didn't end up buying more legos, but we played 2-player Super Mario for a good while (Sorry, I'm a child of the 80s!!)

*RobinW* - Enjoy Harry Potter - I thought it was great! Congrats on the yard sale. I've never been able to get it together to do one of those - I just end up driving stuff to Value Village.

*kuhljeanie*, *tera* and anyone else -

Happy and OP Sunday, Everyone!
Erika

__________________

1 carrot for every 5 pounds lost with Weight Watchers (start May 2015)!

Coaches
I've read my ARC's today and needed to. My weight, though it is just a number my arc tells me, is 271 this morning, a weight change of +1.2 Reasons? Same as yesterday: salt intake from takeout food and fluid/hormones. While the bodily processes are a mystery to me and I am along for the ride as I always am, the salt intake will be lower today and the water intake will be upped. I will persist in victory d@mn it and noteat whatever which is what the sabotaging critic would have me do.

I tangled with two bouts of unbridled eating yesterday. When I get super-puffed up with hormonal shifts and such I feel so awful and when I "feel so awful" I ALWAYS turn to food to "feel better" or if I don't think that I turn to food to "make myself feel better" or alternately "I already feel physically so bad and uncomfortable eating lots will make me happy and I can't feel worse physically anyway". Some rationale! I don't even assume I will feel better if ____ cause the way it is, it just has to pass, but I am eager almost to take advantage of feeling bad as an excuse or permission or a reason to eat whatever I want. THIS is an old extremely harmful pattern. I will be writing my first cheat on this today.

my official credits: weighed myself once, yesterday and today; left food on my plate; did not eat in between meals; did not have seconds; had spontaneous exercise; checked in with my coaches/buddies; tried to eat slowly and consciously; read my arc cards;

Yesterday's challenges were: calming down before my food; recognizing it take 20 min to feel full; had a spoonful of crap standing up-but only one then I sat down (1/2 credit here); did not wait to feel full instead ate something else right away as I didn't feel "full enough" - was not hunger but desire I gave in to.

Billblueeyes you asked this of RobinW

Quote:

Robin (RobinW) - Will you kindly, and discreetly of course, tell me whether it's more proper tomorrow to wish our Ontario friends on this thread, "Happy August Civic Holiday" or "Joyous August Civic Holiday?" I want to get it right and not sound like, well, an uninformed American who is clueless to the nuances of the Great North. Will you be celebrating it yourself, cooking the traditional "Civic Holiday" dishes so that your DD retains the culture?

BBE the best thing you could say to me is "happy last day off before Fall or before Labour Day". It's pretty much how I think of it. Of course I keep hearing of everyone "going up to the cottage" as if everyone has a cottage to "go up to". I never have had one of those. (I'll add the word sadly here.)

AS for the future fortunes of journalism, you know what i really fear? That we will all know what's happening in some weird dramatic celebrity event in Sweden or something and we will not know that the local politician is absconding with the funds for the new highway or something. the focus on the odd, interesting, glamorous worldwide event/celebrity/atrocious criminal monster eclipses the ordinary local everyday unglamourous everyday bits of life that as ordinary everyday citizens we actually have to deal with be it roads/transit/sewers/flooding in the basements etc. and with the local media gone who will be watching and reporting this stuff? they say bloggers but who has the time to dig into the story? To spend the money to follow the trails? To do a story when people go "oh yeah that. of course politicians are idiots and they spend money stupidly and...who cares?" I don't know. it really worries me. That this city editor could not be bothered to know exactly what we did and who we are and when it happened and why when it's all there before he emailed me is unexcusable to me. Why would I treat him like a professional? because I have manners is why...but YOU know how I feel. I just told you. The old saying the devil is in the details can be applied to local vs global interests. We may be interested in Paris Hilton or China or the Middle East and we may be affected as we were with the goings on of Wall Street and mortgages and banks but how did it manifest? Locally. My neighbourhood is going downhill cause they can't sell a house or get a mortgage or my factory closed down and I can't work so I can't buy that loaf of bread at your grocery store or pay more for organic carrots from my local farmer. The local is really important. Ugh. Sorry. I'd erase all that but I won't... I'll just, again do this OFF.

eusebiusThank you for mentioning the memotome.com site. I will check into it. Credit for the maintaining 4lbs!

RobinW methinks refocusing is what we always have to do to deal with weight issues...sometimes more re-focusing, sometimes less. Credit for knowing this and I am so glad you are here with us

Walking Princess You deserve A LOT of credits my friend. You said

Quote:

Why couldn't I just stick to my normal weekday routine?

Hello? Because it WASN'T either a week day OR a normal routine. It was a celebration and a holiday and a weekend. ALL challenges. You did great! Dr. Beck wants us to give ourselves credit for EVERY change in behaviour you did the ALL of the following: left food, packaged food up and didn't eat it, gave food away, budgeted for bigger meals by eating less earlier, stayed conscious of your food choices. Although you didn't see yourself being perfect if you take a look at what you've done so far it is great. We are all works in the making. We never really get there ever, eat perfectly I mean. But you have taken so many steps. Just keep going. You are absolutely "getting it". <---- I give you this because I want you to see that I mean it!

Nuxmaga Credit on being 1000 steps over your daily walking goal, being OP, and on leaving half a roll.

wndranne Credit for taking action. I am reminded of a time when I was in heavy duty therapy and was told that the best place to practice relationship issues is by being in a relationship. I think this is the same. We need to be in it, doing it, in order to create the situations that push us forward and make us face our own selves and our choices... yay for finding the energy to do so.

ChinaMaine Credit for all that walking! And a question, did you get any pictures of those rebar animal sculptures? If not, can you send me a link to where I might search them out?? Thanks!

to everyone - have a good Sunday.

UPDATE at 11pm: Had a tough time today with taste-testing at the stove. I did it several times, once even taking a big enough hunk of stuff to make me go "oh come on. If you're going to eat that at least go sit down then" and so I did, for the second it took me to eat it then I went back to the stove. From here I fell into the "I don't care" sabotaging thought pattern. I resisted, but weakly. This was the worst of it today for me. I felt frustrated most of the day and that's never good.

__________________ 5lbs at a time. one * for every pound lost. RESTART:19/1/2015 - 284.8lbs

one by one -- I didn't take my camera this time. For some reason I don't usually take pics I like when I'm at the gardens. I was pretty bummed when I got there and saw these fantastic sculptures... I found a link on the interwebs, but there's only one pic of the sculptures in the exhibit. Here it is: http://www.wendyklemperer.com/

The weekend is finally over. I did enjoy my bday weekend but the constant stress of the continuous food and food I would not normally eat was very challenging and stressful. It's a relief to be back to normal.

Today, we went to my parents. Breakfast I ate on plan. Lunch, my dad went and got Del Taco for everyone. I had a beef and bean burrito with no cheese and a Ginger Ale. For dinner we had a chicken pasta salad that my mom made. It is my favorite dish she makes and I only get it once a year. I think I went overboard on that and had 2 cups (oops!). My mom also made a bday cake for dessert. It was the only one I had all weekend so it wasn't too bad. I had one piece and I gave away the rest of the cake so as not to eat anymore.

Looking back, I did the best I could througout the weekend and considering I didn't cook one meal the entire three days. Were there things I could have done differently? Absolutely! I learned how to do things a little better for the next time. Live and learn. Other things I just flat out still need to work on. I guess it takes more than 3 weeks to totally change your attitude towards food. I definitely have more work to do.

I am very disappointed in myself though about some of it and happy with other aspects of the way I handled things. It's hard. :-(

One by One - thank you sooo much for your very sweet and encouraging words. I was feeling pretty low and unsuccessful about everything but after reading your post I felt so much better. Thank you for being there for me. So sorry you got up for no reason today. That is so frustrating. On the plus side, you got your exercise in though ;-) Don't worry too much about the weight gain. You know it's just hormones/water etc. and it will come right back off. Just have faith :-)

Bill - great job on your dinner party last night. You deserve lots of credit and a pat on the back for staying on plan last night. Good for you!

Anne - hope you enjoyed your bike ride today. So sorry to hear you are feeling discouraged right now. I don't know if this will help, but when I feel like that, I go read all my ARC over and over until I feel better. That usually helps me feel motivated again and picks up my spirits. Hope it helps a little

Erica - I'm glad you are feeling a little better. Legos is a good idea for your little one, mine loves those things! :-) One thing my little guy likes to do on a rainy day is make a fort in the living room. Then we hide in there and giggle or read books. It's fun :-) Thank you also so much for the encouraging words when I've been feeling so discouraged.

ChinaMaine - the botanical gardens sound beautiful. Sounds like you are doing great sticking to your eating plan and exercise. Keep up the good work!

Nuxmaga - Happy Birthday to you! :-) Boy, do I know how you feel about the challenges of celebrating your birthday. It sounds like you did a great job and were able to stay on plan. Congratulations - big credit! :-)

RobinW - great job with realizing you need to get refocused and then doing so. Big credit! Also, hope you enjoyed the movie with your kids